Eat, Drink and Be Merry, State Democrats

If you drive past the Anaheim Convention Center today, you might feel a rush of warmth. That would be the aura of satisfaction radiating from California Democrats, who are holding their convention there.

Although Al Gore lost in the electoral college, he swept our state by 1.3 million votes, more than enough to account for his lead in the national popular tally. With one exception, every state constitutional officer is a Democrat, as are most of the state’s House members. And with a firm grip on the Legislature, the Democrats hope that they can use redistricting to gain even more seats.

Amid all this good news, wise Democrats should remember that things could fall apart. True, they probably will hold their advantage, all things being equal. But there are several reasons why things might not stay equal.

First, trends seldom last forever. Noting that the Mississippi had gotten shorter over time, Mark Twain once joked that the trend eventually would set New Orleans next to Cairo, Ill. Similarly, if current political trends continue in a straight line, Democrats will win every election in the state and Republicans will join the Tecopa pupfish on the list of extinct California species.

Maybe that could happen, but in politics, it’s more likely that a period of rapid growth will end with stagnation or decline. Take, for instance, the tale of the Orange County Democrats.

For a while in the 1970s, they had everything going for them. Outpacing the GOP in voter registration, Democrats won seats in Congress and the Legislature, and they even got a majority on the nominally nonpartisan Board of Supervisors. The high point came in the 1978 gubernatorial race, when the county voted for Jerry Brown.

Then came the 1980s. County Republicans staged a comeback on Ronald Reagan’s presidential coattails, and then it was the Democrats’ turn to flirt with extinction. Things changed once more in the 1990s with the election of three Democrats: U.S. Rep. Loretta Sanchez of Garden Grove, Assemblyman Lou Correa of Anaheim and state Sen. Joe Dunn of Santa Ana. In both Orange County and the state as a whole, nobody can be sure what the next turn of the wheel will bring.

That brings us to the next reason why Democrats should temper their celebrations. The more you win, the more you have to defend. The Marines’ field manual on war spells out the problem: “We advance at a cost--lives, fuel, ammunition, physical and sometimes moral strength--and so the attack becomes weaker over time. Eventually, the superiority that allowed us to attack and forced our enemy to defend in the first place dissipates and the balance tips in favor of the enemy.”

The “moral strength” part is crucial. Whether Republican or Democratic, a party in power quickly loses the crusader spirit that helped it attain power. After a while, its leaders no longer want revolution: mere management will do. Where they were once humble and attentive, they grow arrogant and careless.

Power brings the leaders’ weaknesses into bold relief, because their mistakes make big news and then become immortal on the Nexis database. We have seen this phenomenon already in the top levels of state government. A few weeks ago, Lt. Gov. Cruz Bustamante had to apologize for uttering a racial slur. And Gov. Gray Davis will always have to live down his notorious 1999 remark that the Legislature’s job is “to implement my vision.”

Ironically, the governor has shown little vision about the energy crisis, content to let the legislative leaders do all the hard work. Fortunately for the state, the Legislature has some energetic and public-spirited leaders, including Assembly Speaker Bob Hertzberg (D-Sherman Oaks).

But a mention of the Legislature brings us to the third reason for Democratic caution. Term limits make it harder for a party to keep its gains over a long period. Before the 1990s, lawmakers could use incumbency advantages to hang onto their seats even if their constituencies underwent demographic change. But term limits now create more open seats, which mean more opportunities for districts to change party hands. When recent population shifts favored Democrats, the results registered almost instantly in Sacramento. But if prodigal Republican voters return to the state, Democratic gains could vanish just as fast.

Such scenarios may never happen. It bears repeating that Democrats are very likely to continue their dominance of California politics, so they have every reason to have a happy convention. Still, they might ponder the end of the movie “Patton,” where George C. Scott delivered a monologue about Roman conquerors enjoying festivities after the wars. He said that someone always stood behind the conqueror, whispering in his ear a warning: that all glory is fleeting.